Consciousness Matthijs Cornelisen

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Consciousness
MATTHIJS CORNELISSEN
Defining consciousness is notoriously difficult. Dictionaries tend to become self-referential

when they try to define consciousness. The New Oxford Dictionary of English, for example,
defines consciousness in terms of awareness, awareness in terms of perception and perception
again in terms of consciousness. Professional dictionaries hardly fare better: the Penguin
Dictionary of Philosophy escapes the problem by simply omitting the term. This ostrich like
behaviour is, strangely enough, not an isolated phenomenon: to ignore consciousness has been
the general policy of science for much of the twentieth century, and it is only during the last 25
years or so that consciousness has again become a legitimate subject of scientific and
philosophical enquiry.
It is difficult to overstate the importance of consciousness. Though some hard-core
physicalists have tried to trivialize consciousness as a more or less incidental side-effect of the
complexity of our brains, it is good to realize that without consciousness we would simply not
exist at all, or if we somehow still would manage to exist, there would be no way for anybody
to know anything about it (or to know anything about anything else, for that matter). Without
consciousness there would be no point to our individual life. In fact, there would be no point to
anything. After all, even the most "objective" scientific explanations exist in the end only "in
the eye of the beholder". If consciousness would not be there to support them, not only beauty,
love, experience, and truth would lose their meaning, but even scientific theories would dissolve
into unobserved paper, ink, and fleeting plops of brain-chemistry.
To think of a completely unconscious universe is for that reason incoherent: without
consciousness there would be nobody around to do the thinking. To think of a largely unconscious
Interestingly even some of the most highly regarded present-day philosophers effectively fall in the
same trap. Searle, for example, who is responsible for what is perhaps most often quoted as the
mainstream view, writes in The New York Times (Volume 53, Number 17, November 2, 2006): "By
'consciousness', I mean those states of sentience or feeling or awareness that begin when you wake
up from a dreamless sleep and continue on throughout the day until you fall asleep again, or otherwise
become unconscious. Dreams are also a form of consciousness." Nowhere in the article does he
bother to define awareness. Note also the casual way in which dreams are added to the equation.
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Consciousness 415
universe in which conscious beings like us are the exception, is at least logically conceivable,
and it is even the majority view in the field of consciousness studies at present, but it is still not
very convincing. It is hard to imagine how a huge, unconscious, and thus inherently meaningless,
dead machine suddenly, after billions of years, in an almost inconceivably tiny corner of itself,
could produce not only consciousness, but embedded in that, truth, love, and beauty - qualities
that in spite of our own puny size and lifespan, never fail to give us a sense of eternity, infinity,
connectedness. One of the great strengths of modern science is that it presumes that its laws
and constants are universal and unchanging throughout the entire immensity of space and time.
It is hard to conceive why comparatively small and unimportant details like most of the known
physical laws and constants would be universal, while the fundamentals of truth, love, and
beauty would suddenly pop-up ("emerge") out of nowhere in the otherwise chance-driven
complexity of our tiny, fragile, and exceedingly short-lived human brains. Nothing is impossible
in this wondrous world, but the view that limits consciousness to human brains (and/or
machines), looks suspiciously like the flat earth theory in medieval astronomy: Just as the flat
earth view took the little patch of land on which we stand as the centre of the physical universe,
so the contemporary mainstream view of consciousness presumes that consciousness is limited
to how it occurs in our human brains. This is an exceedingly narrow view of consciousness,
and as modern science otherwise prides itself on the assumption that the laws, particles and
forces we discover on earth function equally throughout the cosmos, it is not a very plausible
proposition. It seems unreasonable to exempt consciousness from this demand of universality,
and the more so, as a perfectly coherent, meaningful alternative vision of consciousness which
does give it a role throughout the universe is available in the Vedic tradition.
In the newly developing field of "consciousness studies" there is nothing remotely like a
consensus on what consciousness is or does, and a cynic might easily conclude that the only
thing everybody agrees on is that it is a field full of controversies (as the subtitle of the Journal
of Consciousness Studies indicates). In the much older Indian tradition there is no consensus
either, but the Indian tradition has perfected a remarkably effective way to resolve differences
between viewpoints. It presumes that the underlying structure of reality as well as of truth is
essentially hierarchical, that the upper ranges of the hierarchy are ineffable, and that human
theories can never be more than partial expressions of the single but ineffable truth at the
summit. This allows one to look at our many different ideas about the divine and his manifestation
as a family of ideas in which each member represents some truth, but no one can claim to have
the one and only truth. It may be clear how wholesome (if not indispensable) such a wide-
open approach to truth and reality is for the developing multicultural global civilization, and in
It may be noted that the hierarchy implicit in the Indian concept of integrality is not in conflict with
an existential equality. Over the ages, there have been several attempts to synthesize the Indian tradition
from a single, integral viewpoint; one may think, for example, of Vyasa's compilation of the Vedas,
the Bhagavad-Gita, and in more recent times the work of Sri Aurobindo. All these include the essence
of the more specialized approaches of their time, but do not lower themselves to ranking other
approaches to the truth: India has an admirable record of appreciation for the incredible variety that
typifies the human kind. The recent American attempt at constructing an integral psychology by
amalgamation, ranking and pigeonholing of "competing" theories has done a great disservice to the
idea of integrality, which in its original, Indian form is free from self-aggrandizing tendencies.
416 Handbook of Indian Psychology
this article I will try to show how the Indian conceptualization of truth and reality can help to
provide an amazingly beautiful, rich, and comprehensive understanding of consciousness and
its role in the world.
To see how the various views of consciousness are related to each other, one can locate
them conceptually in a three dimensional vector space somewhat similar to the way colours are
described. Just as with colour, there are many ways to categorize the different concepts of
consciousness, but one set of conceptual vectors that seems to cover thefieldrather well consists
of materiality, spirituality, and integrality. Of these three, materiality and spirituality are often
defined as each other's opposite and in arguments they arfc then supported by pointing out the
(sometimes imagined) weaknesses of the other. Integrality attempts to include what it sees as
most useful in the other two into a higher-level synthesis, without accepting their denial of
each other. Though there are exponents of extreme positions on all three dimensions in all
major intellectual traditions, one could probably argue that materiality is the main factor in
contemporary science, while the various schools of the Indian tradition tend to locate themselves
between the poles of spirituality and integrality. Integrality is the position I will try to champion
in this article because it seems to me to be the only one that does full justice to the marvelous
complexity of the manifestation. It is however the most difficult position to formulate
intellectually, because one can, strictly speaking, only do justice to the Indian version of
integrality from the highest possible point in the Vedic hierarchy of consciousness into which
alone the lower forms of consciousness can be "integrated" without violating their own intrinsic
value and dignity. If one tries to achieve integrality horizontally or from too low a position in
the hierarchy, one is bound to err through one or more of the many errors of transpersonal
theory Jorge N. Ferrer quite rightly protests against (2002, p. 87). For the Indian version of
integrality, which is centred round the idea of purna, the Infinite, I will base myself on the
work of Sri Aurobindo (Aravind Ghose, 1872-1950), who by the exceptional depth and width
of his own spiritual realization and his utter intellectual rectitude should probably be considered
its most prominent present-day exponent.
Materiality
The "materiality" vector has been the mainstay of modern science. The great strength of
this view is that it has cut radically through all forms of religious hypocrisy, dogmatism and
superstition, and as a collective enterprise, it has produced an incredibly detailed and fast
increasing knowledge of the physical domain. There is an ontological and an epistemological
side to it. At its extreme, ontological physicalism holds that the physical reality is all that
exists. The great difficulty for ontological physicalism is how to account for experience, love,
truth, beauty and all those other things that do not appear to be physical in any ordinary sense
of the word. Much of this non-physical stuff is in some way or another related to the subjectivity
of consciousness, and physicalists tend to have a serious problem with consciousness. Watson
To indicate colour, at least three numbers are needed, but the three numbers need not indicate
percentages of red, green and blue. One can, for example, cover all colours equally well with three
numbers indicating hue, saturation and brightness, which is artistically useful, as colours tend to
match aesthetically if they differ only on one, or at most two of these three vectors.
Consciousness All
bundles everything not directly physical away as "the trouble",4 and David Chalmers (1995),
though not a physicalist, calls the way consciousness arises out of matter as "the hard problem".
The few adherents to this theory who write about consciousness have different ways of explaining
its (apparent) presence. The main divide is between those like Patricia Churchland and Daniel
C. Dennet, who claim that the mind (inclusive its consciousness) is simply identical to the
workings of the brain, and those like Searle who claim that consciousness is a different, higher
order phenomenon that "emerges" out of material reality at a certain level of physical complexity.
Churchland compares consciousness to heat, which, at least in her eyes, is nothing beyond the
kinetic energy of moving molecules, and Searle compares it to fluidity, which does not exist in
single water molecules but comes into being when you put enough of them together. Both take
it for granted that the brain "causes" consciousness, in the strong, exclusive sense that you
cannot have consciousness unless you have a working brain (or at least a physically existing
functional equivalent of a brain). There are many other positions within this camp, but there is
none that has not been under attack. Churchland and Dennet have been accused by those
outside the materialist camp of explaining consciousness away, and Searle stands accused by
Dennet of confusing subjective illusion with objective reality.
Epistemological physicalism does not bother about deep metaphysical questions regarding
the essential nature of reality, but argues that, whatever the world may be made of, the physical
reality is all that we can know scientifically. Within psychology, classical behaviourism comes
closest to this view: It looks at the human mind as a black box, about which nothing can be
known, or needs to be known, as long as one knows the rules that connect purely physical input
(the stimulus) to purely physical output (the response). Over time, the serious difficulties with
this view became more and more apparent: It is third-person and thus intrinsically manipulative;
almost everything that really matters to people (love, truth, beauty, and so on) happens inside
the black box where it remains outside the reach of behaviourists' enquiry; it does not work in
the simple, pragmatic sense that knowing the stimuli a person receives does not reliably predict
his response except in the most trivial of laboratory situations; and finally, it is not really
possible because of the degree to which the researcher's observations are determined by cultural
influences. In spite of all this, classical behaviourism reigned in psychology for over 40 years
before it began to be discarded, and though psychology has widened its horizon considerably
since then, its influence is still far more pervasive than those who grew up within this tradition
tend to realize.
For this paper I will focus on a physicalist position, that does not deny or hide consciousness
but limits it to the type of consciousness humans have in the ordinary waking state. This position
deserves to be called mainstream for three related reasons. First, it informs much if not most
neurological and psychological consciousness research. Second, the vast majority of authors
in the field who have a different position still take it as the "given view", from which they
subsequently differentiate their own standpoint. Third, it is a view that is based on experiences
and lines of thought that everybody can understand. For the sake of this paper I will call it the
flat earth view of consciousness. This may not be politically correct, as the term is clearly
negatively loaded, but as indicated earlier, I think it is justified to name it in this manner
In an astounding example of sweeping rhetoric, Watson brushed "religion, the life hereafter, morals,
love of children, parents, country, and the like" aside as "the trouble".
because it places the ordinary human consciousness as presumptuously in the middle of the
world of consciousness, as the flat earth view placed our physical existence in the middle of
the physical cosmos. I am inclined to think that the flat earth view of consciousness stands
squarely in the way of a deeper understanding of consciousness and human nature in general,
and that as such it is a serious impediment to our collective progress if not survival. In
contemporary consciousness studies, the most prominent protagonist of this view is John R.
Searle. I will discuss this view in some more detail when I will compare it with the Integral
view.
Spirituality
The defining characteristic of the "spirituality" vector is twofold: (1) that the ultimate reality
is consciousness rather than matter, and (2) that the only state of consciousness really worth
striving for is a state of "pure consciousness". In many ways the "materiality" and "spirituality"
camps are each other's mirror image. The great strength of the "spirituality" camp is the absolute
beauty of the experience of pure consciousness, and the detailed and penetrating psychological
insights this approach to reality has led to. Here too, there is an ontological and an epistemological
aspect. The two big ontological questions in the spirituality camp are the status of the material
world and the status of the individual self. Just as the extreme physicalist position holds that
consciousness is at best a causally inactive epiphenomenon of physical processes, so the most
extreme position on the spirituality axis holds that the material world is nothing more than an
illusionary imposition on the absolute silence, emptiness and purity of the spirit.
Spirituality as ontology plays hardly a role in the scientific mainstream where even strong
idealism is considered "dead" or condemned as part of the essentialism, the bete noir of the
constructionists. In contemporary consciousness studies the phenomenon of pure consciousness
is ignored by most, and its very possibility is denied on the one hand by Steven Katz (1978) and
others who claim that all mental phenomena are socially determined and strangely enough, on
the other hand by Carl G. Jung (1958), who holds that a state without a clearly distinguished
subject and object is inherently unconscious. The possibility of this state has been defended
vigorously, and rather effectively by Robert Forman (1990) who bases himself largely on Indian
sources. In Indian philosophy it has many protagonists and can well be called mainstream. An
overview has been given by Ramakrishna Rao in the Journal of Consciousness Studies (2005).
The idea of pure consciousness can be found throughout the Indian thought, but perhaps
most prominently in certain schools of Vedanta, Samkhya and Buddhism. There are considerable
differences between these three knowledge-systems in terms of their philosophy, but the origin
of the concept of pure consciousness is almost certainly experiential rather than speculative,
and, as we will see, in terms of experience these differences appear less insurmountable. There
are many methods to arrive at a pure consciousness, but the cultivation of detachment is one of
The difficulty of Chalmers's "Hard Problem", for example, can be shown to be due entirely to remnants
of this view in Chalmers's own thought of which he, strangely, does not seem to be aware (See
Cornelissen, 2007 forthcoming).
It may be significant that in the Indian tradition, the materialist view is mainly defended by Asuras
and beginning aspirants before they get seriously involved in their studies. A typical example is the
story of Virochana and Indra in the Candogya Upanisad (8. 7-12).
Consciousness 419
the most commonly practised (and conceptually most interesting) techniques. It works through
a systematic withdrawal of one's consciousness from its involvement in one's thoughts, feelings
and sensations. In the ordinary waking state there is a clear distinction between the perceiving
and acting subject inside, and the world as object outside. Typically, one identifies with the
subject, which one feels as one's "self, but one does not identify with the world, which one
experiences as "other". Strangely enough, the borderline between the two is continuously shifting
and to quite an extent arbitrary. Sometimes people identify with entities far larger than their
own body e.g., their work, their possessions, their family, their country - and sometimes they
look with a certain objectivity even at their own thoughts and feelings. Through yoga, it is
possible to learn how to shift the border between self and world at will and on the path of
detachment, one moves the border gradually further inwards till absolutely everything, including
all one's thoughts, feelings, and actions, are seen as part of outside nature, and only an absolutely
pure, silent self, or not even that, remains on the inside.
Theoretically, one might expect that the result of shifting the borderline between world and
self inwards would be an increasing sense of powerlessness, of shrinking, of dullness even, but
in practice the opposite is true. As one dis-identifies more and more from one's small set of
habitual thoughts, feelings, motives and actions, one experiences an increasing sense of an
infinite, inalienable peace, which can grow into a positive sense of exhilaration, liberation,
and, even, of vastness. It is as if the wall between the world and oneself becomes thinner and
one finds oneself extending beyond the borders of one's old egoic self into the rest of the world
or even beyond it. Ultimately, when one is completely free from all sense of possession and
private, egoic being, there is a definite turning point and one can enter into a totally different
type of consciousness that transcends, encompasses, and/or inhabits absolutely everything in
complete freedom, joy, and perfection. Interestingly, this technique that starts from the naive
subject-object dualism which is typical for the ordinary waking consciousness, is not only used
by dualist traditions like the Samkhya which maintain a division between purusa (self) and
prakrti (nature), but equally by various monist schools like Vedanta. The dualism here, is not
accepted as an ultimate truth, but only as a pragmatic means to shift the apparent border between
self and world, either fully inside or outside till one arrives experientially at a monism of the
spirit (one knows one's atman to be one with Brahman). Even in the yoga of Pataiijali, which
starts with a dualist philosophy, one ends with a monist experience. To what extent and in what
exact manner the material manifestation is part of this oneness has been a major issue throughout
the Indian tradition, and over time many different answers have been proposed. Together they
make a kind of gradient from mayavadin traditions, which stress the illusionary nature of the
manifestation, to purna Vedanta, which stresses that in the end both spirit and matter are
manifestations of the inalienable oneness of saccidananda.
Psychologically the main reason for all these differences seems to be that the exact flavour
of the experience of reversal seems to depend at least to some degree on the line of approach
and the theory in which one's practice is grounded. In its most classical forms, one can
experience, or rather become,7 absolute emptiness, entire freedom of form and content^ in a
total transcendence. One can also feel oneself become one with the undivided All, extending
7
At this level, all knowing is what Sri Aurobindo calls "knowledge by identity": there is no gap
between subject and object, one knows by being.
inimitably through space and time. One can even - and this is perhaps the most mysterious and
beautiful - experience the infinite Presence,righthere in the smallest of things. As the Taittinya
Upanisad (2.6) said (several thousands of years before Katz): "Whoever envisages it as the
existence, becomes that existence, and whoever envisages it as the non-existence, becomes
that non-existence."8 Interestingly, the exact form, which the experience or state of pure
consciousness takes is not only influenced by the "tradition of origin", but also retains a certain
colour or flavor according to the location in one's subtle body from where one begins one's
exploration. If one goes inside, for example, on the level of the hara, near the solar plexus, as
in some forms of Zen, the experience may give a predominant sense of power and solidity. If
one does so at the level of the heart, it may retain an element of personhood, of love, of
compassion. If one concentrates in a centre of consciousness just above the head, the sense
of impersonality, vastness, formlessness may predominate. Accordingly, the Indian tradition
holds that there is a self, a true being, purusa, on each level of consciousness. The common
characteristic of all these states is that the distinction between the separated ego and the world
is not there, while consciousness is. In fact consciousness is very much there, even if it is not
anymore a consciousness of "things" separate from one's "self. All such experiences leave
one with a permanent sense of having seen, or rather been one with something that is much
more true, beautiful, eternal than the ordinary reality. This is its strength, but it is also where
the conceptual confusion starts.
Philosophically, these differences in the flavor of the experiences have led to diametrically
opposed formulations. The most infamous of these contradictions is perhaps that the Samkhya
holds that there are many selves; Advaita Vedanta that there is only one self, and Buddhism
that there is no self at all. Historically, differences like these have led within the Indian tradition
to a welter of competing philosophies, schools and sects. Seeing these differences, some modern
scholars, like Katz (1978) and, in a far more sophisticated fashion, Ferrer (2002, pp. 71-111),
o
"asann eva sa bhavati/asad brahmeti Veda cet, asti brahmeti ced Veda/santam enam tato vidur iff
Taittinya Upanisad, 2.6.
The words experience and state are both inept. Experience because it seems to imply a difference
between subject and object (one typically experiences "something"). State because it seems to imply
a static quality, while this goes way beyond the difference between silence and movement. What is
worse, both terms, experience as well as state, seem to imply subjectivity, and both words could
easily be taken as involving only a state of the mind (or even more limited, of the brain). None of
such labels and distinctions does justice to the quality, truth-level, and authenticity of the "truth-
event" or whatever it could be called. No wonder the ancients resorted to powerful linguistic cop-
outs like tat tvam asU you are That.
This seems to have been the approach of Ramana Maharshi who speaks of the Self as the antaratman.
This seems to be in conflict with the idea that the purusa has no qualities, but it may not. Perhaps one
could say that there is a difference between a state in which one is fully aware but free of thought, a
state in which one is fully aware yet free of feeling, and finally a state where one is in action, yet
aware of not acting. There also seems to be a conflict between the oneness of the Vedantic Brahman
and the many of Samkhya's/wrwsas, but, again, there is not. The standard metaphor is the one of the
ocean and its many waves. One could also compare it to a country and its ambassadors: in diplomatic
circles an ambassador is his or her country. Reality is beyond differences like those between qualified
and qualityless, one and many, which in this view are artefacts imposed by the mind and its language.
Consciousness 421
have come to the conclusion that the whole idea of a single perennial philosophy supporting
the conceptual jungle is problematic. Though there is a point in this criticism, the complete
denial of a perennial philosophy, or at least of a perennial reality, is not the full truth either. For
the traditionalist within the Indian tradition it is not valid because the most respected scriptures
in the tradition, right from the Rg Veda and the older Upanisads to the Bhagavad-Gita, insist
on an ultimate oneness supporting from behind all differences in appearance. For those who
trust their own judgment and experience, the perplexity can be resolved by going beyond the
specific experience offered by one's tradition till one finds an inner place, described in the Glta
and several older texts, which goes beyond all the dualities of form and formless, personal and
impersonal, etc. From the level where the different flavors of "pure consciousness" are still
extremely real to one's experience, it is not impossible, for example, to rise to a place where
one can flip effortlessly from the infinite peace and harmony of the cosmic self, to the utter
freedom and delight of the non-self. The experiences are still different, but while the philosophies
of atman and anatta are each other's opposites, the underlying experiences are such close
neighbours that one begins to get a feel of something indefinable beyond both.
Irrespective of the type of ontology one might arrive at, from an epistemological standpoint
the status of pure consciousness is interesting as it could open a way to unbiased observation.
If the central realization removes the ego from one's deepest sense of identity, there is at least
at that level no longer any support for ego-centric responses to the things that enter into one's
consciousness, and this should in principle allow one to function as a free intelligence without
any bias or axe to grind. In practise it is not as simple as this, however. Human nature is
extremely complex and even when the central realization and purity are there, distortions will
continue to intrude into one's action and even into one's perception due to remnants of ego and
residual impurities in the outer parts of one's nature.
The older Vedantic and Buddhist schools talk in this context about karma that still needs to
be exhausted even after realization, and Sri Aurobindo speaks of the need to transform the
entire inner and outer nature under influence of higher and higher levels of consciousness.
Exhaustion of karma may be sufficient for a passive realization, in which one aims "not to be
reborn" by attaining a state where nothing activates any response or initiative, but, as Sri
Aurobindo (1991, pp. 98, 99) points out, a full transformation is needed if one aims at an
active participation in a further evolution of the manifestation. Interestingly, it is also needed if
we want to use a free consciousness to take psychology further: After all, not only complex
dynamic interventions, but even the simplest description of one's awareness and its contents is
an active, creative process that requires a transformed instrument of expression to reach anything
that could possibly be considered perfect.
Even if we have got rid of all possible sources of distortion, there are still two major issues
to take into consideration before we can confidently declare that by cleaning up our own "inner
instrument of knowledge" we can arrive at reliable subjective knowledge: One is the different
aspects or types of purusa, and the other is their dynamism. I will come back to these in the
section on integrality.
In both Buddhist and post-SarikaraVedantic thought there has been a tendency to consider
the most extreme form of an entirely passive, pure consciousness - an absolute and permanent
emptiness, silence, formlessness - as the highest type of consciousness. Philosophy tends to
strive after the impersonal and the abstract, and in a certain sense, this is the legitimate extreme
of both. But the question remains whether this is really the ultimate nature of consciousness.
And this brings us to the third pole of our conceptual discussion of consciousness, integrality.
Integrality
The materiality and spirituality poles of the debate about consciousness have both their strengths
and greatness, but both deny part of reality. As Sri Aurobindo wrote almost a century ago:
In Europe and in India, respectively, the negation of the materialist and the refusal of the
ascetic have sought to assert themselves as the sole truth and to dominate the conception of
Life. In India, if the result has been a great heaping up of the treasures of the Spirit, - or of
some of them, - it has also been a great bankruptcy of Life; in Europe, the fullness of riches
and the triumphant mastery of this world's powers and possessions have progressed towards
an equal bankruptcy in the things of the Spirit.
(Sri Aurobindo, 1990, p. 11)
So how do we combine a deep love for the material world that has given the West its
strength, with the lofty aspiration for the spirit that has given the Indian tradition its wisdom?
The answer is certainly not in some half-baked compromise, with materialism guiding public
life during working hours and religion private life after five and in the weekend. The real
solution has to come from a deep integration based on a complete acceptance of both matter
and spirit, and this may be possible only in a consciousness that goes beyond the dualities on
which the ordinary mind insists. This may strike the materialist as way too far up in the sky, and
some traditionalists as preposterous, but as long as one's striving for the ultimate reality involves
the slightest denial either of the spirit or of the dynamic, material pole of reality, it is still part
of the world of dualities, and as such it misses the absolute truth which is far beyond the
distinction between matter and spirit.
The absolute, impersonal emptiness of the pure consciousness described in the previous
section plays a major role in almost all spiritual traditions, especially in India, and there are
elements of it even in streams that are normally considered dualistic and theistic,12 but still, it
is not the only form, aspect or type of consciousness, and the oldest and most authoritative
Indian texts point to something else that at least in some respects can be seen as going beyond
the purely passive form of "pure consciousness".
In the Gita onefindsthe concept of the purusottama, the absolute "Person", the parapurusa,
the "Being" beyond dualities like those between saguna and nirguna, ksara and aksara (manifest
and non-manifest, moving and unmoving). With a slightly different stress, there is the idea of
sarvam Brahma, the ultimate who is all, and still more abstractly we have right from the Rg
Veda the concept of saccidananda, the absolute oneness of true being, consciousness and delight,
as the source of all there is in the universe. This absolute, all-inclusive integrality, expressed
with such exquisite beauty throughout the major scriptures of the Indian tradition is so central
to Indian thought that even the mayavadin schools have had to pay at least some formal lip
As in the charming story of Radha who complains that Krsna spends more time with his flute than
with her. In response Krsna gives her his flute, and asks her to see what is inside. Radha looks and
exclaims with wide, open eyes: "Nothing! There is nothing in your flute." To which Krsna responds,
"You'reright,and that's why!"
Consciousness 423
service to it. It is this ability to link absolutely everything in existence up to the transcendent
that gave India that unique "secret ingredient", which was responsible not only for its spiritual
depth, but also for its legendary wealth in all other spheres of life. As I alluded to in the
description of the method of detachment, if one begins with excluding things in one's quest for
purity, it is possible to get stuck in some exclusivity, some form of conceptual or even physical
poverty, but it is also possible to flip into the opposite: one can persist till one reaches through
absolute emptiness into another space and time, which includes absolutely everything
unhampered by the slightest egoic limitation.
If we combine the idea that everything in this wondrous universe is a manifestation of
consciousness and delight with the idea that cit is also cit-sakti, that consciousness is also
conscious-force, then we open the road to infinite possibilities of further evolution. Realizing
the absolute purity of spirit in its aspect of passivity, of receptivity, is presently well within
human reach. It is not easy but perfectly doable as it does not necessitate a complete
transformation of one's nature: one's nature has only to get out of the way, and one receives the
splendors of the infinite in the silence that one is in one's innermost essence. But if this world
is not an illusion, but a true manifestation of the divine; if the ksara is as true as the aksara, if
the dynamic becoming is as much divine as the static being, if the absolute delight manifests
itself dynamically as pure love, then it must be possible to identify with the dynamic as well as
with the passive consciousness of the Divine. Clearly this is infinitely more difficult than the
purely passive identification, as it needs for its manifestation not only a liberated Self, but also,
and this is far more difficult, a perfect, ego-free, "divinized" nature. If we accept this as our
ultimate aim and destiny, then the spiritual evolution of humanity has only just begun. Traditional
moksa is then not more than an essential pre-condition, a first step towards the far greater
dynamic realizations of the future that will transform the whole of life into a powerful, dynamic
expression of the truth of the spirit.
The oldest and perhaps most powerful expression of this truth one finds at least hinted at in
the Vedic concept of integrality, piirna, which stems from the more ancient and heroic period
in Indian history when the highest ideal had not degenerated into the wish "not to be reborn"
but had still the simple strength of "True Being, Light, and Immortality".1
Just as one may accept the dualism of Samkhya not as a statement of the ultimate reality,
but as a necessary step on the way to a higher realization, so also the absolute oneness of the
Advaitin and the sunya of the Buddhist may have to be accepted not as the ultimate reality but
as an essential step towards still greater realizations that were hinted at in India's most ancient
past, but that for their full realization are still awaiting the future. It would be wonderful if the
coming together of the materialist intellect of Europe and the spiritual intellect of India - after
so many long centuries in which they developed separately - is a sign that the manifestation in
matter of the Vedic concept of integrality, piirna has finally become a realistic possibility.
In the field of knowledge this might lead to developments compared to which the immense
achievements of the physical sciences we are now witnessing are just the first beginnings:
Thefirstnecessity is to know the One, to be in possession of the divine Existence; afterwards
we can have all the knowledge, joy & power for action that is intended for our souls, - for He
13
The ideal of what is probably the most recited verse of the Indian tradition: "From non-being to True
being; from darkness to Light; from death to Immortality!" (Brihadaranyaka Upanisad, 1.3.28).
being known all is known, tasmin vijnate sarvam vijnatam, not at once by any miraculous
revelation, but by a progressive illumination or rather an application of the single necessary
illumination to God's multiplicity in manifestation, by the movement of the mahat & the
bhuma, not working from petty details to the whole, but from the knowledge of the one to the
knowledge of relation & circumstance, by a process of knowledge that is sovereign & free,
not painful, struggling & bound. This is the central truth of Veda & Upanishad & the process
by which they have been revealed to men.
A Tabular Comparison
This discussion of various concepts of consciousness will be concluded with a table listing
a number of differences between the "flat earth" mainstream view, which is based on the
ordinary waking state, and the integral Indian conceptualization of consciousness, which is
rooted in the living tradition of Indian spirituality. As indicated in the beginning of this article,
there is no consensus in science on the nature of consciousness, but what I have tried to describe
here as the mainstream view is the concept of consciousness that most non-specialists seem to
use and that authors within the field tend to differentiate their own views from. Searle is one of
the few professional philosophers to support most aspects of this view. For the integral Indian
view, I am basing myself largely on Sri Aurobindo. The differences may look so great, especially
if tabulated together like this, that it seems almost illegitimate to use the same term for both.
But if we look closer, then it becomes immediately apparent that everywhere the concept of
mainstream science simply describes a minor, partial manifestation of what is meant by
consciousness in the Indian tradition.
Table 1 Two concepts of consciousness
The "Flat-Earth" Mainstream View The Integral Indian View
Types of Consciousness
There is basically only one type of There are many different types of consciousness,
consciousness: our ordinary, mental both "higher" and "lower" than the ordinary
awareness of ourselves and our surrounding. human sense mind.
The few states recognized as different from Other states, of which there are many, are
the ordinary consciousness (such as dream, considered different in type; many of them are
sleep and trance) tend to be considered considered higher than the ordinary mental state
as less conscious than the awake state. in the sense of being more conscious, more
beautiful, more true, more loving, more pure and
more powerful.
Intentionality
Intentionality and the distinction between Intentionality, etc. are considered as typical only
subject and object are considered as the defining for the ordinary mental consciousness, but are
characteristics of consciousness as such. absent in some other types of consciousness.
(contd.)
14
Searle does not subscribe to this view, but many others in the materialist camp do.
Consciousness 425
(contd.)
Mind and Consciousness
Mind is the wider concept. Consciousness is Consciousness is the wider concept. Mind is just
a property of some states of the mind. one form of consciousness.
The Subliminal
The physical and mental processes of which The physical, vital, mental, psychic and spiritual
we are not aware are classified as processes of which we are normally not aware
preconscious or as unconscious. may be subconscious or superconscious to us,
but they are not unconscious in themselves.
Preconscious processes are being explored Through the various processes of yoga, one gets
by cognitive psychology in laboratory access not only to darker and lesser types of
experiments. Some dark corners of the consciousness but to whole worlds of inner light,
unconscious are studied by depth-psychology power, beauty, knowledge, love and joy, that go
through free-association, dream-analysis beyond anything one can even imagine in the
and sometimes hypnosis. ordinary waking state.
Identity
One's identity is one's "self-construct" an One's identity is the (eternal, immutable) self,
assemblage of contents of consciousness. which is the very essence of one's consciousness.
When the body loses its ability to maintain When the body loses its ability to maintain
sensory-motor contact with its surrounding, sensory-motor contact with its surrounding,
e.g., under narcosis or in death, it is said that e.g., under narcosis or in death, it is said that the
the person "is losing consciousness". In person "withdraws from the body". In other
other words, the Flat-Earth view identifies words, the integral Indian view identifies the
the person with the body. person with the centre of his consciousness, not
with his body or mind.
Consciousness is One
The unitary character of consciousness has The unitary character of consciousness has been
been acknowledged as the "binding problem", acknowledged as the oneness of the individual
the as yet unanswered question how a mass consciousness with the consciousness of the
of parallel neurological processes gives rise divine (and all other beings).
to a single conscious experience.
The Other
If you want to be objective, then "you.. .must If we are all part-manifestations of the same
describe the behaviour of man in no other divine consciousness, then one can recognize
terms than those you use in describing the (and love) oneself and ultimately the divine in
behaviour of the ox you slaughter" everyone we meet.
(Watson, 1930).15
(contd.)
Watson's classical behaviourism is long gone, but given the widespread enthusiasm for CBT and the
almost compulsive use of the word "behaviour" in definitions of psychology, it is good to remember
that this amazing quote is part of the central argument that started psychology's love-affair with
behaviour.
(contd.)
Awareness and Agency
Consciousness is only awareness. Consciousness is both awareness and force
(Cit is also Cit4akti)}6
Consciousness is ephemeral if not The consciousness in things is the secret cause of
entirely epiphenomenal. their "name and form".17
The Prevalence of Consciousness
Consciousness is the exception in an Consciousness is all pervasive.
otherwise unconscious universe.
Consciousness occurs only in humans or at Consciousness exists not only in individuals, but
most in a few other animals and machines. throughout the cosmos and even in the
transcendent beyond.
Reality
Matter is primary. Consciousness "emerges Consciousness is primary. Seemingly
out of unconscious material processes at ,* unconscious matter and energy are the end
certain level of complexity. product of a process of exclusive concentration
within the conscious existence of the cosmos.
Thoughts and feelings exist only in our Thoughts and feelings have their own conscious
(brain-based) minds. existence, independent of the individuals who
sense and express them.
The ultimate reality is matter. The ultimate reality is saccidananda:
consciousness and delight are intrinsic to existence.
Consequences
If consciousness exists only subjectively, then If consciousness, truth, love and beauty exist
it is only natural to consider related qualities objectively, then they are obviously primary, of
like truth, love and beauty, as secondary, and the greatest value, and most worth pursuing for
worth pursuing mainly for purely pragmatic, their own sake.
commercial or hedonistic purposes.
If nature is an unconscious machine, evolving If nature is gradually evolving towards an ever
through brute laws of chance and survival, more perfect and complete manifestation of
then pursuing one's own (or one's group's) consciousness, truth, love, and beauty, then our
fitness, survival (and procreation), even at individual aspiration for them is the most natural
the cost of others, is the legitimate and most expression of nature's own will.
appropriate expression of the laws of nature.
(contd.)
16
The "spirituality" centreed schools within the Indian tradition also tend to stress (or even limit
themselves to) the passive aspect of consciousness.
17
In the Integral view, names, forms, and the laws of physics are mental phenomena that express in the
mental plane the same unknown, which expresses itself in the material plane as a physical "object".
Matter and mind are seen as two different expressions of one single conscious existence.
Consciousness All
(contd.)
If our ordinary waking consciousness is the If there are ranges of consciousness far beyond
only thing available, then striving for our ordinary state, then pursuing them is the
anything higher is a romantic, but ultimately most sensible thing to do.
pathological error.
If our present nature is all there is, then If growth of consciousness is the overriding aim
satisfaction of our desires is the only thing of life, then every event, "good, bad or
we can reasonably strive for. indifferent", is an occasion for growth; there are
no limits to the intensities of joy, light, love,
right action that one can develop.
If each one's consciousness is locked up in a If consciousness is ultimately one, and quite
separate brain, and entirely dependent on its independent of the brains to which individual
survival, then people are intrinsically separate portions of it temporarily attach themselves, then
from nature and from each other, and doomed people are intrinsically and intimately connected
to an unending battle for resources. to each other, to nature and to the divine. Love
and cooperation are then the natural outflow of
the underlying unity, and nature's own striving
after truth, love and beauty will inevitably
prevail in the end.
Conclusion
Consciousness seems to be as hard to understand for humans as water must be for fishes,
but given its central role in every aspect of human life, it may be crucial for our collective
development if not survival to have a deep and comprehensive understanding of its nature and
possibilities. Our concept of consciousness has a direct bearing on our most basic sense of who
we are, how we relate to others, our environment and the Divine, on our values and on what we
see as the ultimate nature of reality and the aim of life. The concept of consciousness that
presently prevails in mainstream science takes it as an epiphenomenon of physical processes in
the brain without known purpose or function, and this can only add to an increasing sense of
psychological alienation and futility, or to a growing disenchantment with science, not exactly
the type of developments society can sensibly look forward to. As long as psychology sticks to
this limited view of consciousness, it will have about as much chance of any major theoretical
breakthrough, as physics would have, if it would limit itself to the study of rocks, arguing that
fluids and gasses (not to speak of plasma) are not solid enough to be considered legitimate
objects of enquiry, or if it would dispense with mathematics on the ground that so few can fully
master its mysteries. All major problems humanity faces are essentially psychological, and
humanity can simply not afford much longer a psychology that is crippled by such a limited
understanding of its core subject area. Our concept of consciousness is closely related to what
we think about our identity, and that again has a profound influence on what we do, become
and dare to aspire for. If our basic understanding of who we are begins to match the greatness
of our descent, then we may have some legitimate hope that
[our] tread one day shall change the suffering earth
And justify the light on Nature's face.
References
Aurobindo, Sri. (1940/1990). The Life Divine. Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Ashram.
Aurobindo, Sri. (1958/1991). Letters on Yoga. Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Ashram.
Aurobindo, Sri. (1951/1994). Savitri, a Legend and a Symbol Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo
Ashram.
Aurobindo, Sri. (2004). Kena and other Upanishads. Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Ashram.
Chalmers, D. J. (1995). 'Facing up to the problem of consciousness'. Journal of Consciousness
Studies, 2 (3), 200-219.
Cornelissen, M. (2008). 'The evolution of consciousness in Sri Aurobindo's cosmo-psychology'.
In: Helmut Wautischer (Ed.), Ontology of Consciousness. Boston: MIT Press.
Ferrer, J. N. (2002). Revisioning Transpersonal Theory: A Participatory Vision of Human
Spirituality. New York: SUNY Press.
Forman, R. K. C. (Ed.). (1990). The Problem of Pure Consciousness. New York: Oxford
University Press.
Jung, C. G. (1958), Psychology and Religion: West and East. Collected Works, Vol. XI (Bollingen
Series XX) (p. 484). New York: Pantheon Books.
Katz, S. T. (1978). 'Language, epistemology and mysticism'. In: Steven T. Katz (Ed.), Mysticism
and Philosophical Analysis (pp. 62-63). NY: Oxford University Press.
Mautner, T. (Ed.). (1997). Penguin Dictionary of Philosophy. London: Penguin Books.
Pearsall, J. (1998). The New Oxford Dictionary of English. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
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Defining consciousness is notoriously difficult. Dictionaries tend to become self-referential

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